Battlefield 3: End Game review

It’s been around 18 months since Battlefield 3 first hit our rigs and consoles. If you are a twat like me and missed out on the last couple of DLC packs, fear not! End Game is awaiting your purchase, or simply awaiting login if you are already an existing premium member. It isn’t called End Game for nothing, Battlefield 4 is pegged to be released by the end of this year after all.

In all honesty, I think it’s a little too late to rush out and buy a premium membership if you haven’t done so already. What is a premium membership? Simply put, it’s the purchasing of every existing map pack at one discounted price (along with some other nice nifty bonuses). Even though there are still a couple of servers running the DLC of yesteryear, those servers are graveyards consisting of lonely tanks and empty mission objectives.

Fortunately those servers do still exist, so feel free to round up a couple of your retired veteran buddies and go fill them up. Too much effort? Agreed. Rather shell out just over a hundred bucks to go join the next big party on the calendar, that of End Game. Why pay for what has passed and is no longer hip? Sign up for this latest and greatest End Game shindig and we will throw in a dirt bike, and trust me, you want this dirt bike! What do you get for your money? I’m glad you asked…

New Maps

As with every other DLC released thus far, there are new maps included in End Game. The new kids on the block are Kiasar Railroad, Nebandan Flats , Operation Riverside, and Sabalan Pipeline. These new maps are definitely enjoyable, but it almost feels like something is lacking when compared to the original maps released with the game. For example, on the map Kiasar Railroad, there is a lumberyard with piles of logs stacked everywhere. While numerous trees throughout this map can be destroyed with just about anything, these particular log stacks are coated with some sort of iron varnish which makes them indestructible. It leaves a lot to be desired, especially since the Battlefield series prides itself on maximum destruction. How cool would it be to shoot a rocket into one of those piles and have them fall onto a camping squad of soldiers or even a passing vehicle?

This is not to say that the maps are bad, but rather that it doesn’t feel like the new maps really offer anything new over their predecessors. The whole premise remains the same; vast expanses of land dotted with buildings (on certain maps) in which to get up to some Battlefield shenanigans, which is not a bad thing at all.

New Vehicles

There are two new anti air vehicles, one for each faction. Basically, both of these vehicles are armoured jeeps with some AA weaponry fitted to them. They are bound to make any pilots life hell, but they are by no means game changing.

What actually does feel like a fantastic addition to the mobility division are the new dirt bikes. I couldn’t for the life of me understand why Bad Company 2 had those awesome quads, and Battlefield 3 had nothing to fit that role. The bikes are back baby, and they are a hell of a lot of fun! Who cares about shooting the enemy? Do you have any idea how much fun it is riding around, popping wheelies and ramping over hills? How rewarding it is to engage in a high speed escape from a helicopter or tank, resulting in death approximately 99% of the time? These bikes are littered all over the maps in all the game modes, and if you haven’t gathered by now, they are a truck load of fun to ride!

What’s even more awesome is that you can have a passenger join you for the journey. Garth joined me one evening, and we were simply riding along when we came out of the bush and ended up behind a tank on one of the side roads. What followed was a sneaky high speed chase, (tanks are surprisingly fast) with Garth pounding away at the tank with his rocket launcher. As soon as we were spotted it was all evasive manoeuvres, ramping along the conveniently placed dirt mounds and other natural terrain. It was phenomenal!

Lastly, in the conquest game mode, having a particular point on the map gives your team access to a slow moving dropship which cruises slowly over the battle. It’s all fun and games sky diving into the action, at least until you see the option to deploy from the dropship in a vehicle! Holy crap, that awesome feeling I had when that parachute opened and pulled my vehicle out into the open sky! It was fantastic, and landing smack in the middle of battle never gets boring. This is a nice touch by Dice, and I absolutely love it.

New Game Modes

Air superiority? Sounds like a really great idea. Except that I could never really find any full local servers with people playing this mode. It’s alright, a 200 ping European server will do! Think conquest, but with fighter jets alone. There are blimps dotting the map and you need to stay in the general vicinity for a short while to capture the point. Sounds cool right?

Its not. Perhaps you are like me. You fly your vehicle like a piece of mouldy cheese riddled with holes and covered in tomato sauce (a clever metaphor for what my plane kind of looks like after a battle. Yes the tomato sauce is blood, well done! Now back to the point). High ping aside, I could not enjoy this game mode. Granted that may be due to my poor piloting skills (which actually aren’t too bad), but all I did was spawn and have a missile hot on my tail shortly after. “All you need to do is flare,” I hear you shout. Thanks captain obvious, but alas, there are a half dozen other enemies who have a missile with my name written all over it. Jets are not my cup of tea, but you can at least rank up some unlocks for your jet pretty quickly in this mode, but it’s really not to my liking.

Personally, I think that this mode could have been a lot better had it been something along the lines of helicopter warfare. Imagine a map where there are a few small islands which have control points, and the only way to traverse between each island is a variety of helicopters. This way it could still be focussed on air warfare, but still involve some run and gun action on the islands below. I hope you’re listening Dice, I want this in Battlefield 4!

Capture the flag redeemed this DLC for me overall, and it is a great mode addition. The age old classic, capture the enemies flag and defend your own! Throw in some classic Battlefield mayhem, and you have something that can be really enjoyable. This is not to say that it doesn’t have some annoying elements, because it certainly does. Imagine this. You’ve just ridden half the distance from your base to the enemies on your bike, and hopped off for the sake of a sneaky approach. You pick off the odd enemy here and there, dodge the tank so as to not draw attention, and lo and behold! The flag is in your sight! At this point, you can either A) be sniped from God knows where, B) be driven over by a surprise camping tank, C) Be blown up into the sky by somebody who layered the area with a million stacks of C4. Yeah it’s not too easy capturing the flag if the whole enemy team decides to camp.

Regardless, it certainly is a lot of fun! Garth and I were once again cruising along on a bike, headed for the enemy flag. We dismounted a short distance away and snuck into the enemy camp. Standing between us and the flag is a small building. I placed my C4 and blew out the rear wall, creating easy access to the flag. From this point, everything goes to hell. Enemies open fire as I run for the flag. Garth places covering fire like a boss and I snatch it. We make a run for it only to see our escape vehicle has somehow blown up. There is nothing left to do but run. Needless to say, attempting to run like half a kilometre to drop off the flag is a silly idea. We died painfully, but it still was a highly enjoyable in my books. Lesson? Make sure you have a getaway vehicle.

Conclusion

Apart from the maps not offering anything groundbreaking and some minor annoyances, The End Game DLC does what it sets out to do; keep you hooked on Battlefield 3 until its big brother successor is released.

8.0

Battlefield 3: End Game was reviewed by Matthew Figueira

Defence of the Ancients? More like Defence of the cabbages! Have you seen my head? I look like a Merino Sheep on pole. NO SHANGE only SHAPPIES! :D View all posts by Matthew →

CoD is a different game to Battlefield, which is an open war-zone sandbox. It always has been.

FoxHoundR

my dad says mre is better. if i have more money in the bank i am better than you. also popular means more money.

http://twitter.com/eXCheez Gareth Lagesse

Your dad’s wrong in this context though. Sorry man.

More money doesn’t make you better. Any hard-working teacher is better than a Kardashian or a Paris Hilton. You’re confusing “better” with “success”. A Paris Hilton is more successful than a teacher, financially speaking.

Which brings us back to your particular reasons why CoD is “better” than Battlefield. Which are flawed.

Skyblue

I rule in favor of the plaintiffs, it would seem that COD players really are illiterate as displayed by “exhibit FoxHoundR”.

On a side note, I am stunned this individual had the patience to find the pictures he was looking for on Google, think of all sights he has seen on his quest to be a troll. Roy Batty would be envious I tell you.

FoxHoundR

this is a battelfield gamer

Sir Rants-a-Lot Llew

Does your girlfriend know you are posting her pictures on the internet?

http://twitter.com/SaveTheQueenIX umar bastra

Ouch, Nice

Admiral Chief Erwin

BUUUUUUUUUUUUUURN

http://www.facebook.com/people/Carl-Angus/685100819 Carl Angus

FoxHoundR: 0

Burn dispensors: 1

http://twitter.com/SaveTheQueenIX umar bastra

Doing some low level trolling there …

Deon Steyn

FALSE – You can’t possible tell what she is playing.

http://twitter.com/SaveTheQueenIX umar bastra

Troll 0
Deon Steyn aka LOGIC 1

HvR

Except that she is playing with a console …

Deon Steyn

Ah yes but the troll did say she’s a Battlefield gamer.

Jonah Cash

See what happens when you post a plea to the community Gavin, you wake up people like this dude….. And we are not aloud to say what we think about his comments cause we want to play by the rules… Please guy just cool it a bit…

http://twitter.com/SaveTheQueenIX umar bastra

Been a whole day affair, wonder where he was sleeping. suddenly there’s this random troll running amok

http://www.lazygamer.co Gavin Mannion

Yeah this was not the intention…

Jonah Cash

It is OK, as I said on that story… I have a thick skin!! As do most of your readers it would seem except for a small minority…
PS Thank you for not bringing up Liverpool, its still a bit raw!!!

Twakkie

Dont worry Gavin, we understood what you meant. Some people always takes the hand when you offer them the pinky.

Admiral Chief Erwin

id hit that

Jacques Jooste

with a baseball bat

Jacques Jooste

never waste ammo my man

http://twitter.com/eXCheez Gareth Lagesse

I paid for this as part of the Premium pack and have still not played as I cannot download due to iBurst’s inability to play nice with Origin.

Uberutang

You missed the quads from Armored Kill. (noob that you are)

You should join us on Tuesday nights for BF3 fun (PC – 9ms ping never gets old)

Steve0064

The local Armoured Kill maps always seem to be empty, yet the Metro 24/7 maps are always full…

Uberutang

We pick a empty server, get some friends in and within a round of 2 the server is full!

People are seemingly scared to join ‘low player count’ servers. Play and they will come!

I really enjoy playing on the ‘bmw and geezers’ clan servers. Decent folk.

Twakkie

I HAAAAAATE metro! Its just grinding all the way. If a game has a player count above 24 becomes just boring and stupid. List of map packs from favourite to “die with fire” are AM, EG, AK, Vanilla and finally CQ.

http://twitter.com/MatthewFig Matthew Figueira

Yeah I did miss some of the DLC’s I regret that i did! You know, I had a nagging feeling about that, but I did at least make sure that the bikes were indeed a new addition quad bikes never crossed my mind!

Twakkie

Julle kies ook altyd die dae wat ek nie kan jol nie

Admiral Chief Erwin

MATTYFEEEEEEG

http://twitter.com/MatthewFig Matthew Figueira

^_^

DaxterZA

I dont play BF3 on PC any more, the amount of hacking is just crazy….

http://twitter.com/ClericZA Kobus Nel

Sure I’ve seen a fair share of hackers, but they’re quickly reported and banned. It the Colonel 100’s that pisses me off. Bastards with a sh!t-bucket and no life, getting so good that his presence ruins the match. But it’s good to put a sniper round through his eye-ball or take his tags. Payback is a bitch

Jim Lenoir (Banana Jim)

I’m enjoying End Game. Air superiority isn’t as polished as I thought it would be. I really thought that they’d throw in a few different jets (maybe the Swedish Saab Gripen or one of the new Chinese fighter jets). Or even throw in a mode, where you have to defend the INFAMOUS gunship.

Capture the Flag is awesome though, and while I get the complaints about base-camping, if you play smart, you can actually fend off the campers, and mount counter-attacks and bring your enemies some PAIN!!!!!. I think for me (personally) Capture the Flag joins Scavenger and Rush as my top modes. Awesome stuff, and perfect for evening gaming after a shitty long day.

HvR

The aircraft simulation isn’t accurate enough to make real difference, the Gripen will be F-18 with a different look and the J-20 is to similar to the F-35.

What would be nice (and a bit South African flair) will be ATE retrofitted SuperHinds as used by South African mercenary groups in Sierra Leone, proper tank like gunship with multiple passenger/side gunners.

Twakkie

Would be nice to have a bit of African flair in the game but could you imagine the nightmare it would be to try and balance something like a gunship with multiple gunners. AK was ruined because of the gunship especially rush.

Jim Lenoir (Banana Jim)

They did nerf the gunship in AK, so it’s no longer this annoying death-dealer. A few laser-assisted Javelins, or a few IGLAs are all it takes these days.

I’ve actually been in a few AK rush matches where we successfully held off the attackers, purely by bottlenecking them and destroying their gunship. It’s hilarious how people panic when their gunship is getting continually nailed.

Twakkie

Ja I know it is MUCH better but it took way too long for DICE too patch it. I think how they did it is brilliant, especially in rush, but because it was so OP in the beginning, a stigma of AK maps have remained. I rarely find any AK maps on SA servers and if I do, it is never Rush games. Its actually sad because some of my greatest memories where made on AK maps.

Jim Lenoir (Banana Jim)

Yeah, I know what you mean. When I find myself on the defending side, I have to fight the urge to swap sides. I think that’s the problem with having that gunship there. It’s just not fun to die on spawn.

http://twitter.com/MatthewFig Matthew Figueira

I do genuinely think that CTF would make for a heck of an entertaining competitive mode. Imagine the sorta attacks or strats the pro players would come up with :O